1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the art of seating, more particularly to the field of safety seat systems intended to hold a person, especially a toddler or infant, in a chair in such fashion as to reduce or eliminate the possibility of the person from voluntarily or involuntarily leaving the chair.
2. Description of the Art
Infants and very young children should be provided with some type of restraining device when seated in a high chair or other type of chair in order to protect them from injury if they should accidentally fall from the chair. Young children, such as active toddlers, should be provided with similar protection as it is remarkably easy for an inventive, active child to voluntarily work out of a high chair and sustain injury.
Various devices have been proposed in prior patents as a means for retaining a child in a chair. Patents known to me at the filing date hereof that describe this type of device consist of the following U.S. patents:
U.S. Pat. No. 1,259,604, Cook, issued 1918; PA1 U.S. Pat. No. 1,902,367, Johnson, issued 1933; PA1 U.S. Pat. No. 2,084,448, Merchant, issued 1937; and PA1 U.S. Pat. No. 4,819,988, Hellstrom, issued 1989.
My market survey of seat restraining devices currently being sold indicate that none of the devices proposed by the above patents is employed commercially at the present time.
The conventional child restraint system employed with high chairs now on the market consists of a belt that extends about the child's waist and a strap that extends between the child's legs. This type of safety belt system, however, is inadequate because there is simply too much slack in the belt system and not enough support for the child no matter how tightly the belt is adjusted. This results in the child being able to slide forward and/or slouch to one side, so that the belt system is not an effective control. Some prior art devices, such as that of U.S. Pat. No. 4,819,988, help to preclude a child from sliding forward by incorporating a rigid pelvic abductor between the child's legs. The abductor prevents the child from sliding the pelvis forward, but an occupant can still shift his/her hips to one side, thereby resulting in slouching.
Conventional child seat restraining systems, and those of the above patents, have failed to account for the flexibility and inventiveness displayed by young children which enable them to escape from seat restraining systems more easily than is generally recognized. The prior seat restraining devices do not provide optimum protection for a child. There is, as a result, an unfulfilled need for an enhanced child seating restraint system, and the stimulus for my present invention was to satisfy this need by developing a new child seating restraint system that is capable of restraining a child in a more effective and safe manner than prior art devices.
Another principal objective of my present invention is to provide a new child safety seating system that includes a structural member configured so as to preclude a child from sliding forwardly to an unacceptable or unsafe degree. A further principal objective is to provide a system that fits easily onto current standard high chairs without any of the special adaptations required by prior art devices.
A further and important principal objective of my present invention was to develop a child safety seating system that is capable of providing posture support for the child who is just beginning to use a high chair. Such a child, perhaps five or six months old, often cannot hold themselves upright for an entire feeding. Parents often resort to pillows or towels to prop up such a child. The present invention is designed to provide the necessary posture support for such a child. None of the prior art devices are capable of attaining this objective.
Young children find it relatively easy to lift one or both of their legs and gain enough of a foothold on the seat of a chair to raise themselves to a standing position. This is an obvious dangerous situation since the child is quite likely to fall from the chair. Another important and principal objective of my present invention is to provide a restraint system for a child seated on a chair that reduces or eliminates the possibility of the child standing up on the chair, so as to thereby offer additional protection for the child while seated.
The manner in which the present invention satisfies the above objectives, as well as other principal and more specific objectives, will become apparent in the full and complete enabling presented below.